4B Naturals who blow-dry and flat iron

[TRINITY05]

4B's How often do you blow-dry and flat iron? I found someone who is very gentle with my natural hair, her blow-dryer is not as hot as the dominican salon, and she educates me on what is best for my hair. I was thinking about getting my hair blow-dryed and flat-iron once a month and wondering what you ladies thought.

If you blow-dry and flat-iron:

How often?

How long are you wearing your hair straight before you shampoo?

Have you noticed any breakage?

Have you retained length?

Can you recommend any products for shine w/o losing the body and fullness of hair.

If you are using a color that's working well for you, besides henna, what brand is it and is it a permanent, semi-permanent or rinse?

 

[sweetgal]

Bumping for you!!! I'm curious to know if there are any or many 4b's that do this method on the board

 

[TRINITY05]

Bumping......

 

[Your Cheeziness]

You may get some answers here:
http://www.longhaircareforum.com/showthread.php?t=522931

http://www.longhaircareforum.com/showthread.php?t=196649

These are threads with naturals who use varying methods to straighten. Their main objective is to heat straighten and retain length.

 

[TRINITY05]

Thank you!

 

[Imani]

I used to flat iron weekly when I was transitioning, my hair still retained length, but I did not feel I could keep that up and reach optimal health/length in the long run.

Right now I am using heat every few months. Like for 2011, I plan to flat iron 6 times. When my hair was shorter, I'd wear it straight for a week before washing again. Now, I wear it for 2 weeks, pulled back some sort of way the second week.

For shine, the healthier and more moisturized my hair got, it is pretty shiny w/o much additional product. I just steam DC w/a good moisturizing conditioner (like joico) and then a light serum. (design essentials has a pretty good serum and mist)

As for color, I used to get demi-permanent rinses at the salon. I was getting them for shine more so than for color. But now that my hair is healthier I don't really need them for shine.

I have not noticed any serious breakage from my current level of heat usage. I used to get some breakage when I was doing it weekly during my transition, but that couldve been weak relaxed end snapping off.